All Too Human
by geekgasm
Summary: They're just a boy and a girl who are losing everything all at once, so much so that all he thinks he really has left is her. Harry/Hermione.


**All Too Human**

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_The eruption of lived pleasure is such that in losing myself, I find myself; forgetting that I exist, I realize myself. _

- Raoul Vaneigem

_xxxx_

"You don't understand," says Harry.

That's all he seems to say or _feel_ these days. Hermione flushes red and opens her mouth to apologize, but Ron doesn't allow it.

"I don't _want_ to understand," he growls, eyes becoming narrow, and his face beginning to resemble his mother's as it always does when he's about to explode with anger, "I mean I can't understand how-"

"Exactly," Harry glares.

"You _arse_, I wasn't finished! I can't understand why someone whose known so much loneliness so badly wants to be left alone some more!"

"I've never whined to you, now have I, Ron?"

"You don't have to whine. I can see it all over your face, the way you crumble when Sirius is around, how you cling to him and to Dumbledore, those _pathetic_ looks you've been shooting at my sister. Harry you're a mess, you're a complete mess, and you-"

"Ron," Hermione holds up a hand and Ron's mouth hangs open around the beginning of the next word in his spiel, "Harry, look. What Ronald is so eloquently trying to say is that... "

"Yes?" Harry, had he not been so flustered with her logical, Hermione-ish tone, might've arched an eyebrow.

"Well, give us a little credit," she picks up her books, "No, we're not parent-less, we weren't _chosen_ the way you were, we're not the ones teaching the patronus charm to other students and to some extent, we really can't empathize completely with your situation."

Remarkably, Ron and Harry are wearing matching expressions. Both are awed by her calculative method at solving highly emotional situations, especially since they both knew that despite her near-

worship of logic, Hermione Granger was... well, highly emotional.

"But we're your friends, Harry," Ron finished.

"Friends," he repeated the word, trying for their sake to agree with them, but coming up short, "That doesn't change who I am."

"You don't think that if Voldemort had killed my parents, or Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, that neither I nor Ron would be capable of feeling just like you do?"

"You can't apply a hypothetical situation to reality, not _this_ reality."

"Why not, Harry? And as for every other reason you have to fight Voldemort, you share those reasons with us. Death eaters aren't exactly... picky. You're not the only one in danger."

"Thanks. That makes me feel so much better."

Ron lets out a strange half-growl, half-sigh sound followed by the beginning of a curse word that he quickly swallows, remembering the younger students in the common room, whose plate-sized eyes he can't help but notice. They're all looking at Harry. They may not know to what extent their headmaster has been jeopardized nor the extremes of Harry's role in all that's happened, but they aren't stupid either.

They look to him the way Dumbledore's Army does, and Hermione's face softens when she realizes this, remembering all of a sudden the way the first years tremble in Umbridge's wake. Peril and near-expulsion aside, she wouldn't have traded _her_ first year at Hogwarts for what they were going through.

Those were good times, she thinks. Chess games, invisibility cloaks, Wingardium Levi_o_sa...

Ron stalks out of the common room, feels a million stares on him as he does so. The only person who doesn't look, is Harry, who's immediately interested in the fireplace.

"He's only human, Harry," Hermione sighs, opening a book and trying to work out how she's going to make peace.

"So you agree with him?" he tries to make it sound like an accusation, but his voice is almost a whisper, and not just because of the finely tuned ears listening in all around them.

"Of course I do. All he really wants is for you to be okay, Harry. How could I not agree with a thing like that?"

He's quiet for a long time. So long in fact, that eventually the crowds begin to disperse, abandoning the common room in favour of a good night's sleep before having to rise again tomorrow, likely to the sound of Umbridge hollering at them, her voice magnified ten times its normal size. Harry doesn't even look up when Fred and George Weasely sneak through the portrait, well after curfew, pockets overflowing with their latest designs.

"Goodnight," they say in unison, and Hermione gives a wave before turning back to Harry.

"You should get to bed," she exhales tiredly and piles up the books that she'd never really intended on reading - tonight, anyhow.

"Hey... " he touches her wrist, "I guess... I mean, I _am_... well, I'm sorry. There's just-"

"A lot going on?"

"Yeah."

"It'll be worth it."

"I hope."

"I know."

"Well, you know everything."

For the first time in her life, she _laughs_ at that observation but adds, "I'm trying to feel though, Harry. I am."

"Feel?"

"I know," she bites her lip, not entirely sure if this is right to say, "I know I can never feel how you feel... but please know that we try. We _do_ try, Ron and I. Because what you've been through, what you're going through is very real for you, as it would be if it were happening to either one of us."

"And I'm grateful, really I am," he stands up, stretches and then frowns, "D'you think Ron'll forgive me for being such a git?"

"Of course he will," Hermione smiles, retreating towards the entrance of her dormitory as well, "You're human too."

xxxx

After Sirius is gone, Hermione struggles beneath Harry's gaze. Well, it's not so much a _gaze_ anymore. He doesn't really look at anyone for more than a few seconds, a quick glance, just to keep up the illusion of acceptance.

But you don't have to be Hermione and know everything to know that he's in pieces on the inside. She doesn't even breathe when he glances at her, three times a day, once at breakfast, once in potions, once before bed. She's afraid that anything will set him off.

Ron, being Ron, has his heart in the right place and tries to sway Harry with distraction but for heaven's _sake_ Sirius has only been dead a week before the main focus of their conversation belongs to quidditch once more. Actually it's not so much "conversation" as it is Ron talking incessantly.

Aside from the many meetings Dumbledore has undoubtedly had with Harry since his reinstatement as headmaster, Hermione can't help but want to _say_ something. She wishes for someone else to help him grieve, maybe Ron's father or Remus Lupin... but then, there wouldn't be much grieving going on with either man around anyway. There hasn't even been a funeral.

"You wanted to talk?" Harry takes a seat on the floor next to her despite the fact that she's leaning against an empty armchair.

A knot of anxiousness tightens in her stomach, her throat sort of shivers.

If Dumbledore couldn't ease the desolate look in his eyes, what could she possibly do? She shuts her eyes tight for a few seconds and tells herself that even if her words bring no comfort to him, she owes it to their friendship, to at least try.

He seems to deduce as much.

"This is about him, isn't it?" he says in that soft, yet solid voice.

"I... I... " but there's no books on how to be human, so Hermione tries to just feel out the words, "I don't really know what to say... I just thought... "

She blinks rapidly, uncertain about why she feels like crying. For Sirius? For Harry? For that deepening sense of dread that has overcome them all since they laid eyes on the Dark Lord?

"Things are going to get worse, before they get better."

"Oh," she's surprised by his straight-forwardness, suddenly reminded of him teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts.

He raises his eyes and looks into the fire. Hermione remembers all the times they've stared into it, and how they began to do so more frequently after Sirius had contacted them through it. And now he was gone and so was that comfort, and the fire burning in the fireplace seemed like a cold one, incapable of bringing warmth or guidance.

She can't help it anymore, the tears come and they don't come quietly. She starts out breathing deeply through her nose, several droplets of moisture rolling down her cheeks. Then through gritted teeth she lets out a sob and her breaths turn into wheezes.

Without even looking at him, she stands up, looks away, swiping furiously at her eyes with her sleeves and becoming frustrated with the way that her hair sticks to her temples.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she repeats over and over again, not even being able to see him when she does eventually look down at him, because of the tears, "I'm so _stupid_. So bloody stupid!"

"If you're stupid than there's absolutely no hope for the rest of us," he's still speaking softly, "Hermione, it's okay."

"It's not! Merlin - he was your - your... and here _I _am, blubbering about it. Oh, Harry, I'm just awful. I'm just... I'm going to go to bed before-"

"And risk your entire dormitory smothering you with overbearing love and affection? Sit down, Hermione."

"But-"

"Sit."

She does so, and for the next little while, she is only vaguely aware of the arm around her as her body convulses with sobs, sniffles and the first real _sorrow_ she's ever felt. Sirius Black's death is many things, big and small, epic and personal. She knows that his death has robbed Harry of a precious mentor and and a certain crucial, well-deserved affection, and therefore, she knows that the odds have been swayed drastically in the favour of those who wish to harm him.

This is what war feels like.

Later, when her head is against his shoulder and she's beginning to sense the familiarity of the Gryffindor common room around them, does Hermione allow herself to remember the smaller things. Now, just as she'd reminisced her first year at Hogwarts, she remembers her third. She recalls danger, excitement, the look of pure, unadulterated joy on Harry's face... and Sirius Black with his matted hair and sunken face, placing two warm hands on her shoulders and acknowledging her efforts to save him.

In a way, he was supposed to have been a mentor to them all. Now he is gone, and Hermione cries for him, cries for Harry, cries for everything that is going to test them, everything that's going to make them stronger but first, break them into pieces.

Harry lets her be, and feels himself easing into a sort of neutral grieving state as well. He forgets who he is, who she is, what they are to one another and suspects that she does the same thing because soon they're just burying their faces in wet robes and a slowly moistening carpet and trying to _feel_ out the anger and the sadness. Right now, they're just a boy and a girl who've both lost something precious.

When he's ready to recognize himself, Harry Potter, again, he lies on his back and lets the tears run down the sides of his face and dry. She stills at his side eventually and he feels a bit of coarse hair against his hand and breathes in the faintest whiff of vine wood and thinks, _Hermione. _

"I'd say that you're human but... " Harry begins when they're finally apart again and about to retreat to their dorms.

"But?"

There's a stronger tone and the sweet prelude to a smile, "Well, you're Hermione."

xxxx

Almost a year and a half later, she wants to be anyone _but_ Hermione.

Somehow, despite the fact that the ministry is corrupt, the werewolves are looking for them, their destroyed-horcrux count is depressingly low, nothing seems as bad as the fact that the three of them have suddenly become two.

_He's only human_, Hermione says in her head, over and over, reaching for an older version of herself bring comfort to the here and now, _Human like me..._

She's sinking, but it's much different from all the times before. This is different from the time when Sirius died, when Dumbledore fell, when the death eaters wreaked havoc on their school, their _home_.

Now she feels utterly and completely drowned. Now she doesn't even want to climb out of this hole because the prospect of doing so seems too exhausting. So she lets her feet drag on behind Harry, she doesn't look up even when she sees the tell-tale black smoke drawing dark lines across the sky, she lets her hair turn into a tumbleweed and she ignores the fact that she shivers even when it isn't cold. She doesn't think there's a fire in the world that could warm her up at this point.

Harry voices her mantra, "He's only human."

She snorts in response, chest burning beneath where the locket lies, "You know Harry, I'm not sure I believe in that anymore."

"Why?"

"Well... Death Eaters are human too, Bellatrix, the Malfoys...Voldemort."

"Voldemort is not human."

"Oh, he must have been, once. He was Tom Riddle once."

"He isn't human because he doesn't know how to love," he grimaces and stares at the roof of the tent, "If he were anyone else, I think it might be sad... I hate that I can almost feel sympathy for him, but I can't help it."

"Do you think he ever... you know, wonders what it would be like to-"

"No. No, and I don't ever put myself in his shoes. I think I'd go mad."

"Right. Of course not." she retreats the foot of the bed that Ron used to sleep in, next to her own.

It occurs to Harry that he and Hermione have never really existed without Ron, the way that Ron and Harry have never existed without Hermione. They've always been three... except in those moments, those brief but very _real_ moments, that Harry feels out of place when he's in their company. Like in their fifth year, with so many ominous fates swirling around them, when he felt that they'd never be able to understand what he was going through. All those times when he felt like he was moving forward towards his destiny, and it was leading him to dark corners of the world where Hermione and Ron couldn't follow.

And then there's those moments where it was _them_ moving forward, and Harry who was left behind. He has watched his friends grow from the day they stepped onto the train, meeting Hermione mere minutes after meeting Ron because as though the universe had somehow known that they needed her.

Now Hermione's sitting alone, needing Ron, and well... not Harry. Had the other boy been around, Harry suspects that this would be a cue for him to leave the tent, away from them so that they could exist without him.

It's wrong to feel jealous, he knows that. But he can't ignore the grumble in his throat and the red hair that flashes through his mind should belong to Ginny, but it keeps shortening and becoming Ron's, the last person he wants to be thinking about because... because...

_I'm a stupid, selfish, git._

He looks to Hermione again and, _Emphasis on selfish_.

He walks towards her slowly, but her eyes don't rise to meet his gaze. Has she even heard him approach?

Seeing her cry makes the world feel a lot smaller. One would think that it's only ever possible for him to forget who he is and what he's meant to be during the happy moments of his life. But Harry Potter _isn't_ an optimist, not really anyway. How can he be? He hasn't yet forgotten the eleven miserable first years of his life, and while he isn't bitter, there's always that little inkling of worry in the back of his head. There's always been a war for him to fight and he's always known it, even whilst playing quidditch, visiting Hogsmeade, talking to Sirius, kissing Ginny Weasely...

"This is bloody insane," says Hermione, her voice betraying the angry words, "The fact that we're out here, doing... well, not much actually. And without Ron... "

Harry doesn't think she can feel the moisture on her face because the Hermione he knows hates tears and would never cry so freely in front of him.

Would she?

No. No, she's staring at the brown flap that covers the entrance to the tent and imagining Ron Weasely walking through it. She's leaning back against his bed and breathing deeply, searching for the scent of him, she's wishing that-

"I'm tired, Harry."

The sound of his name throws him off, the world that had recently shrunk just a little expands back to its normal size. He remembers that they are friends. Only.

"I know," he stands beside her and she looks up at him.

"Sit down."

He blinks once, twice, three times, "Are you sure?" He sort of squirms, not entirely sure he can trust himself at the moment.

But Hermione _does_ trusts him and her brow furrows, "Of course I am."

"Okay."

They sit like that for some time and he tries to focus on the crackling radio to avoid hearing her shaky breaths and quiet sniffles. But despite his utmost effort, his mind wanders and he stops listening for the names of the others that he cares about. He shifts his head just a fraction to his left, and is pleased that her hair is shielding him from her gaze.

Then she shivers, and his resolve crumbles and he tries to think of all the reasons why a boy might want to comfort a girl, maybe as a sister, or a cousin, or a friend. It doesn't matter so much, he realizes, when she doesn't respond to him. Maybe if she'd curled into his touch he'd be in a little more trouble. But she doesn't move, and he's ashamed to think that he's glad for it, minus the sharp pangs of envy stabbing eagerly at his insides.

He stays strong. Not even when she comes apart, buries her head in her hands and sobs, does he give into temptation. His arm rests like marble across her shoulders, fighting against itself like the rest of him.

It's the song that does him in.

It begins innocent enough, and he doesn't know that they're going to dance until they're on their feet and she's staring up at him in confusion and maybe a little bit of something else...

He sees her more clearly after he's taken the locket from around her neck, but doing pushes him even more dangerously towards doing something he'll later regret. The chain stretching against her hair arouses a memory of another time when all seemed lost. She sure had taken her "time" explaining how _exactly_ they were going to 'save more than one innocent life' in their third year.

He runs his eyes over her, surprised that it's the first time he's really done so. She hasn't changed.

It's _him_ whose changed.

He's almost ashamed that the fact Hermione actually is a _girl, _is becoming apparent to him now, when they're treading through the darkest leg of their journey. Together. He wonders if the pull between them is a side-affect of the pain he's feeling and the thought of the pain to come. But it can't be... because otherwise this would've happened to him countless times before.

The darkness lingers and she lets out a small sob and the world becomes _so_ small that it begins to suffocate him. He forgets the war, forgets Harry Potter and Hermione Granger and becomes barely anything more than a just a boy. It all seems so clear. They're just a boy and a girl who are losing everything all at once, so much so that all he thinks he really has left is her.

Its been so long since he last asked a girl to dance, but then they're dancing in the forest and everything is dark all around him except the song that's playing in her eyes, all around them, all through them.

Grief and sadness has brought them here, but when he dances with her, its like finally coming up for air after an eternity of drowning and not being allowed to die, it's like relief. When he twirls her and she cracks a smile, he's climbing up out of murky water, and smelling the grass and feeling that sun and now its _happiness_. One brief moment, but a moment all the same between a boy and a girl, and it can't be wrong because they deserve this.

It progresses naturally from there and he looks at her without worry. He's taking in her eyes and hair and is so mystified he feels more pressure than pain when she accidentally steps on his toes. Her consideration tries to take her out of the dance, but he doesn't let her, using the opportunity instead to pull her even closer so that they're swaying. The peace is so overwhelming it makes them both cry.

The song is ending, the radio makes popping noises as it tries to pick up a signal. She begins to pull away from him, but the length of his arm, warm and human against her lower back keeps her pressed to his body. Before she can recall the situation they're in, his lips are on hers, drowning out the reality and the rest of her identity. Every inch of her skin flares with strange cold-heat as she tries to discern what he tastes like - despair, confusion, _hope - _it's unlike anything she's ever felt before.

The loss she feels when he pulls away is just as powerful. It feels like years have passed since they've been standing there, and she thinks that maybe the vines of the trees have grown up around their feet and are preventing them from leaving.

He steps back, hands still around her waist and takes in her perfect skin, matted hair, shiny brown eyes and sort of sees a girl he used to know... but then his eyes move lower, to her swollen lips, and he draws her to him again.

But it's too late, in the few seconds he spent letting air pass between their bodies, she's woken up from the haze. She remembers that she's Hermione and she's supposed to have feelings for Ron Weasley but...

He's _really_ fucked up this time. And for all that Gryffindor courage, he can't bring himself to look at her.

"I'm sorry," he says, he bends to pick up the locket and it feels like the weight of the world is hanging on its chain.

"Are you?" she challenges, "Is that all?"

Well no, it isn't. But he certainly can't tell _her_ that.

"I suppose we are to go back to our lives, I to Ron and you to Ginny," he flinches when she says Ron's name.

"Seven years, Hermione, _seven-_"

"Six and a half."

"Do you even know what month it is?"

"Yeah, yeah I do," suddenly its him who's sitting down on the steps and she's towering above him, "It's December. It's going to be Christmas soon. It's going to be Christmas and... well, you're all I've got."

"Okay?"

"Okay well, I'm not sorry."

He closes his eyes, "You should be."

"_You_ kissed _me_, remember?"

He can't take anymore of this. He can't take that accusatory tone of her voice, the way she's sort of teetering, not entirely sure she can stay standing on her own two feet. So he gets to his and he crosses her without looking at her, but he can practically smell the tears filling her eyes and God, what does she _want_ from him anyway?

When he is gone she whispers, "I kissed back."

There is a war inside of her and tonight, fear wins.

xxxx

The new year starts, not with resolutions, but with confessions.

In the new year, Hermione looks into a broken mirror and accepts that aside from being cleaner and better-groomed, she mostly wants to have straight, red hair and freckles all over. And since she can't have that, she angrily pulls her hair into a big bun and all but staples it to the back of her head. It feels good to have something tight up against her scalp.

Then she tells Harry:

"If it wasn't so cold outside, if I didn't feel so bloody empty on the inside, I would want this."

"Want what?" Harry turns to look at her. He doesn't think she can say it.

He's wrong.

Her brown eyes narrow, red where they should be white, but never so bright as they are right now, "You know very well what."

They must be close to the water, because he feels more cold than usual.

He confesses, "You know how I told you that I'd never put myself into Voldemort's shoes?"

"Yes," its relevant, she knows it is because for the first time since they danced, since they kissed, he looks her in the face.

"I lied to you then," his voice breaks, "Hermione, can we forget who we are?"

"You make me forget who I am... "

"I feel the same way sometimes."

"... it isn't right, it isn't right... " _I don't care_.

Many days go by where they can pretend to not be who they really are. It's like a drug for Harry, and for Hermione, its a way of seeing him smile. They cry together. They let themselves be swept away by darkness, because it's the only way they can progress to just feeling numb.

Sometimes they talk about themselves, about _Harry and Hermione, _as though those two people exist only on some other plane. As though they're just characters in a storybook, who aren't real, but who feel real things.

The girl and the boy lie on their backs in the tent, heads next to each other, telling stories about two people they pretend not to know. They feel themselves healing, it's enough to help them go on. Their real identities have made them weary, and so they forget themselves for just a little while.

One night the boy tells the girl a love story. But he trails off at the end because they hear something coming from outside the tent, and so it's time to wake up from the dreams they've been writing and become real again.

He looks her in the face before they apparate. She gives him a smile and it's her best confession yet.

xxxx

Ron returns and Harry and Hermione are too overjoyed to feel the loss of something that they have not yet been able to understand.

Somehow though, the awkwardness that has overtaken their interactions has alleviated. Harry and Hermione can breathe around each other again, and be themselves, rather than nameless bodies. It feels... comfortable.

He's so comfortable, that one day he teases her, "So, you're a little more full now?"

She blinks, "What do you mean?"

"You said you were feeling empty."

"Oh," she laughs and slides down on the steps next to him.

"So now all I have to do is light a fire somewhere and get rid of Ron, and I'll have a shot with you?" he grins.

She swats the back of his head a laughs even harder, "No."

"No?"

"No... just light a fire."

xxxx

"I told you a love story once," says Harry, "About a boy who loved a girl."

"Yeah," Hermione kind of grins, "What was _that_ all about anyway."

"Well, it wasn't about Ginny."

She yawns as she hands over the night watch to him, "It's almost over, Harry, I can feel it ending."

"The war?"

"The war."

"You're sure?"

"I'm sure," she holds his hand.

Tonight, tomorrow, forever... love wins.

xxxx

Hermione tastes like dreams that are coming true, with just a few notes of desire hidden behind her lips, something he's sure he's going to investigate fully later on.

He never wants to forget what it's like to be loved by her, and so he pulls away from her lips and the fanfare is drowned out by the sound of her breath.

It's _her_ and it can only ever be her.

Still he whispers, "Hermione Granger?" against her lips, and his tongue brushes hers briefly as she opens her mouth to reply.

"Harry Potter?"

"Just checking."

**fin**


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